It's hard to overstate the excitement five-string banjo master
Alison Brown generated with
Simple Pleasures, her debut album in 1990, and its 1992 follow-up,
Twilight Motel. Though she'd established a reputation for virtuoso musicianship with
Alison Kraus'
Union Station over several years, these albums revealed a stylistic innovator on an instrument whose primary players were male. In addition to bluegrass and folk,
Brown is equally proficient in jazz, Latin, blues, classical music, and global genres.
On Banjo is her seventh album and first since 2015's wonderful
Song of the Banjo. With her longstanding quintet and special guests, she delivers an uncharacteristic, all-instrumental date that amounts to a musical autobiography.
Opener "Wind the Clock" pays homage to
John Hartford -- particularly his "Gentle on My Mind."
Brown enlists a string quartet as she winds bluegrass chops inside a jazzy harmonic progression. Clarinetist
Anat Cohen joins for "Choro Nuff," a melodic and rhythmic reinvention of the 19th century Brazilian instrumental folk form. The interplay between principals is dazzling as they crisscross Brazilian and Latin jazz as the rhythm section syncopates.
Brown knew she wanted to play banjo after hearing
Flatt & Scruggs' "Foggy Mountain Breakdown" at age ten. Here, she and banjoist/writer/comedian
Steve Martin offer "Foggy Morning Breaking," a flowing celebration of bluegrass and mountain music.
Brown plays in the left channel,
Martin in the right. They dovetail and underscore one another in unison and call-and-response with quietly dazzling chops. The tune is given additional wings by mandolinist
Sierra Hull, fiddler
Stuart Duncan, guitarist
Chris Etheridge, and bassist
Todd Phillips. Speaking of
Hull, she and
Brown offer a striking, fleet-fingered, intricately detailed duet in "Sweet Sixteenths," wherein
Hull uses every note on her instrument's first string. "Sun and Water" is
Brown's visionary medley of
George Harrison's "Here Comes the Sun" and
Antonio Carlos Jobim's fingerpopping samba "Aguas de Marco" ("Waters of March"). She gets assistance from flute, piano, Hammond B-3, and percussion.
Brown effortlessly binds one melody to another amid rhythmic invention from two percussionists and her bassist, husband, and producer
Garry West. "Old Shatterhand" is prime
Brown. Written for the band, it joins swing jazz and progressive bluegrass to rock dynamics and Baroque harmony. "Regalito" was composed specifically for classical guitarist
Sharon Isbin, who elegantly goes head-to-head with the banjoist on the intricately detailed melody. "BANJOBIM" is a banjo-composed jazz-samba with lush chord changes and sultry flute from
John Ragusa. A set highlight, its chart finds
Brown playing an all-wood banjo with a sound hole called "the banjola." "Tall Hog at the Trough" is a virtuosic, fire-breathing, banjo and fiddle duet with lifelong friend
Duncan. Closer "Porches," with
Kronos Quartet, revisions a melody by
Stephen Foster. Despite the title, its interwoven lyric and harmonic frame renders it a parlor waltz and a pastorale simultaneously.
On Banjo is an adventurous, dazzling, skillful showcase for
Brown's advanced compositional and boundless playing skills that directly addresses her restlessly creative musical appetite. ~ Thom Jurek
